The Montana Senate Administration Committee passed SB 243 on February 5. It amends the State Constitution to say, “In a general election, a majority of votes is needed to be elected.” If the bill passes the legislature, the voters will vote on it in 2010. The sponsor is Senator Joe Balyeat (R-Bozeman). One wonders if Senator Balyeat has Instant-Runoff Voting in mind. The bill consists only of the one sentence quoted above.
I don’t know how he could have Instant Runoff Voting in mind, since it certainly does not guarantee a “majority winner’.
Here is a 4-candidate Instant Runoff Voting election (candidates named A,B,C,D):
#voters their vote
35% A > C > D > B
17% B > C > D > A
32% C > D > B > A
16% D > B > C > A
Instant Runoff Voting selects candidate B as the winner, beating A in the final round, 65% to 35%.
But wait!
A huge 67% majority of voters would rather have candidate C than candidate B. And candidate C received nearly twice as many first-place votes as candidate B, 32% to 17%. And an even larger 83% super-majority of voters would rather have candidate D than B (and D got just a little fewer first-place votes than B). So the claim that IRV “elects majority winners” is seriously misleading. Also…
* A is a spoiler (if he would drop out of the race, C would win instead of B).
* The first row of voters have an incentive to betray candidate A by pretending candidate C is their actual favorite – then they get their second choice instead of their last.
* The third row of voters have an incentive to betray candidate C by pretending candidate D is their favorite – then they get their second choice instead of their third.
Also, C is the Condorcet “beats-all” winner, but doesn’t make it to the final round: 65% majority says C>A; 67% majority says C>B; 84% majority says C>D.
And A is the Condorcet “lose-to-all” loser, but makes it to the final round (65% majorities say others>A).
Are they so afraid of Third Parties gaining traction that they have to move the goal post. Disgusting, & really lame! Shame on Balyeat!!!
We need to keep single member districts and plurality elections. We need to keep the Electoral College system. We need to repeal all limits on contributions, expenditures and reporting rules. We need to simplify and drastically reduce ballot access rules, or eliminate Government printed ballots altogether. This will give us the best electoral system.
To reduce government power, we need serious term limits on office holders: 3 terms for US House, 1 term for US Senate, Pres and VP 2 terms, Governors 2 terms, other state reps and senators 6 years (8 in some states) and, most importantly, most judges should be limited to 2 years and out.
We must abolish eminent domain and judicial contempt of court powers. We have to expand the power of judges and juries to overturn bad laws – FIJA.
We should quit wasting our time and energy on crazy, stupid ideas that will actually reduce our liberty such as direct election of Pres and VP, National Popular Vote, PR, IRV and other schemes that will make things more confusing and give more power to the State and the S o c i a l i s t s.
The Libertarian Party can win now.
We just have to quit wasting our time on all these foolish initiatives, and get busy winning. If we focus on the essentials of party building, good radical LP candidates, fundraising and candidate training – we can win now!
It’s time to get serious about winning. The ball is in our court.
Georgia is now the only state that has runoff general elections as well as party primaries, and there’s a drop in turnout for the runoff. In last December’s runoff for US senator, e.g., the turnout was 54% of the November 4 turnout.
The Libertarian nominees pulled enough votes to force runoffs for both US senator and one public service commissioner’s post, which is also a statewide election.
Runoffs are a bad idea – whether instant or delayed.
Single member, plurality elections have proven to be the best system. There is nothing wrong with parties, independents and primaries either.
We need to make access to ballots fair, equitable and generally treat all candidates for the same office equally – as in Wisconsin.
And, of course, our best electoral system of all is the ingenious Electoral College.
We ony need to get all States with more than one House member to adopt some form of the Maine/Nebraska system to choose the delegates.
#4 Turnout for the last 3 gubernatorial runoffs in Louisiana (1991, 1995, 2003) was higher than for the general election. Turnout for the 2002 senate runoff was even with that of the general election.
Turnout for the 2008 senate runoff in Georgia was higher than for the 2002 general election senate turnout (Saxby Chambliss was elected in both races).
In effect, the drop in turnout argues that we should have presidential elections every year so that voters will show up to vote in state and local elections.
Or alternatively, presidential elections should be held on a different date than congressional and state elections. Congress could set a different date for congressional elections, and forbid concurrent state elections.
Note you compared the senate runoff turnout with the general election presidential vote. 4.4% fewer voters voted in the senate race than voted in the presidential race.
#1: What I think you’re missing about IRV is, it simulates what would happen if there were simply a real, live runoff with the lowest candidate eliminated, and with each voter allowed to make a new choice.
Using your example:
35% A > C > D > B
17% B > C > D > A
32% C > D > B > A
16% D > B > C > A
Instead of IRV, let’s say a new election is held, with candidate D eliminated and the three remaining candidates still running. If voter turnout remains the same and people’s preferences haven’t changed, everyone who voted for those first three candidates still will, and everyone who voted for candidate D will instead choose to vote for candidate B, giving B 33%. And then in a third runoff election, all of the individual voters who had voted for C or D will vote for B, because, as illustrated, they prefer B over A.
So in a plain old runoff system, candidate B ultimately wins a majority. All IRV does is make that “instant” by eliminating the need for three separate elections.
Also, your example assumes that people’s preferences are 100% consistent for EVERY candidate. The odds that every single D voter would select B second and C third are probably extremely low. Realistically, there would be variation.
In every voting system, there are mathematically possible scenarios which could lead to undesireable results. I believe that in IRV, those scenarios are rare. The scenario you described could happen, but would require so much voter uniformity and unusual decision-making that it seems highly implausible.
#6: Interesting that you called the two rounds in Louisiana the “general election” and the “runoff,” instead of the “primary” and the “general election,” as many people do. Since Louisiana does not have party primaries in state and local elections, the voters don’t get as fatigued as they do in Georgia– which potentially has FOUR rounds in its electoral process.
Louisiana restored party primaries in congressional races in 2008, so the 2002 US Senate election was a two-step process.
“Congress could set a different date for congressional elections, and forbid concurrent state elections.”
That won’t happen.
I got the 54% figure for Georgia’s Senate runoff turnout from a post here at BAN.
#8 The Louisiana Secretary of State styles the 2nd round as a “runoff”.
I am aware that the 2002 Louisiana senatorial election was conducted as general election followed by a runoff. There was no dropoff in turnout despite the runoff being held in December.
In the 2008 congressional race for Louisiana’s second CD, turnout for the general election was 59% less than in the Democratic runoff. Can we conclude that the voters were fatigued by the new election system.
In November 2002, 2,029,991 votes were cast for senator in Georgia. In November 2008, 3,752,577 votes were cast for senator in Georgia. In the 2008 senate runoff, 2,137,956 votes were cast. Since more votes were cast in the 2008 runoff than in the 2002 election, the logical conclusion is that voter fatigue was not an issue in 2008. In both cases, the senate race was top of the ballot (in 2002, 4,130 more votes were cast for senator than for governor).
Only 95.6% as many votes were cast for senator as were cast for president in the general election. The 54% figure comes from comparing the number of apples cast for president with the number of oranges cast for senator in the runoff.